🧩 VS Code Extensions Scraper — Installs, Ratings & Publisher Data

Extract data from the Visual Studio Code Marketplace — install counts, ratings and review counts, publisher details, categories, versions and trending metrics — for any extension. Pull the most-installed extensions, find what's trending this week, search by keyword, browse a category, or list everything from a publisher. It's the Marketplace analytics you'd otherwise have to reverse-engineer from a private gallery API, returned as one clean row per extension. Export to JSON/CSV/Excel, run on a schedule, call via API, or connect to Make, Zapier or n8n.

🟦 What is the VS Code Extensions Scraper?

It turns the VS Code Marketplace into a structured dataset. Pick a mode — popular, trending, search, category or publisher — and it queries Microsoft's public gallery API and returns each extension with its install count, average rating, review count, publisher, categories, tags, version, update dates and trending figures. Built-in extensions are filtered out, so dev-tool builders, market researchers and competitive analysts get only the real third-party Marketplace landscape.

What data does it extract?

• Extension ID & display name (name, display_name)
• Publisher ID & display name (publisher, publisher_display_name)
• Install count (install_count)
• Average rating & review count (rating, rating_count, weighted_rating)
• Latest version, last updated and release date
• Categories and tags
• Short & long descriptions
• Icon URL and the Marketplace URL
• Trending metrics — daily, weekly and monthly (trending_daily, trending_weekly, trending_monthly)

⬇️ Input

Run it five ways — popular, trending, search, by category, or by publisher:

Field	Description
scrapeMode	popular, trending, search, category, or publisher
searchQuery	Search term (required for search mode), e.g. python, docker
category	Category name (required for category mode), e.g. Programming Languages, Themes, Linters
publisher	Publisher ID (required for publisher mode), e.g. ms-python, esbenp
sortBy	InstallCount, Rating, PublishedDate, LastUpdatedDate, or Name
trendingPeriod	daily, weekly or monthly (for trending mode)
maxResults	Cap the run (1–1000)

Example input

{
  "scrapeMode": "search",
  "searchQuery": "python",
  "sortBy": "InstallCount",
  "maxResults": 50
}

⬆️ Output

Every extension is one clean row (view as a table, or export JSON / CSV / Excel):

{
  "name": "python",
  "display_name": "Python",
  "publisher": "ms-python",
  "publisher_display_name": "Microsoft",
  "version": "2024.4.1",
  "description": "A Visual Studio Code extension with rich support for the Python language...",
  "short_description": "Python language support with extension access points for IntelliSense, debugging and more.",
  "install_count": 128000000,
  "rating": 4.21,
  "rating_count": 612,
  "categories": ["Programming Languages", "Debuggers", "Linters", "Data Science"],
  "tags": ["python", "django", "flask", "jupyter"],
  "marketplace_url": "https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=ms-python.python",
  "icon_url": "https://ms-python.gallerycdn.vsassets.io/extensions/.../icon.png",
  "last_updated": "2024-04-18T10:15:00.000Z",
  "release_date": "2018-01-26T00:00:00.000Z",
  "trending_daily": 12,
  "trending_weekly": 84,
  "trending_monthly": 320,
  "weighted_rating": 4.18,
  "scraped_at": "2026-06-26T15:30:00.000Z"
}

💡 Use cases

• 🔍 Developer-tool market research: rank extensions by installs and ratings to size a category and spot gaps.
• 🥊 Competitor tracking: monitor a rival publisher's extensions, versions and install growth over time.
• 📊 Publisher analytics: list everything from a publisher and benchmark their reach and review scores.
• 📈 Trend spotting: use daily/weekly/monthly trending metrics to catch fast-rising tools early.

❓ FAQ

How do I scrape VS Code Marketplace data? Pick a scrapeMode (popular, trending, search, category or publisher), add the matching field (e.g. searchQuery or publisher), then Run. You get structured extensions with installs, ratings, publisher info, categories and trending metrics.

Do I need an API key? No. It uses the VS Code Marketplace's public gallery API — no login or token required.

Can I list every extension from one publisher? Yes — set scrapeMode: publisher with the publisher ID (e.g. ms-python or esbenp) to pull their full catalog.

How do I find trending extensions? Use scrapeMode: trending and set trendingPeriod to daily, weekly or monthly. The output also includes trending_daily, trending_weekly and trending_monthly figures you can sort on.

Which categories can I browse? Standard Marketplace categories such as Programming Languages, Snippets, Linters, Themes, Debuggers, Formatters, Data Science, Machine Learning, Testing and more — pass one in category.

How can I sort the results? Use sortBy: InstallCount, Rating, PublishedDate, LastUpdatedDate or Name. Built-in Microsoft extensions are excluded automatically.

What's the difference between rating and weighted_rating? rating is the raw average star score and rating_count is the number of reviews behind it; weighted_rating is the Marketplace's adjusted score that factors in review volume, so a 5-star extension with three reviews doesn't outrank a 4.5-star one with thousands.

How many extensions can it return? Up to your maxResults cap (1–1000); it paginates the gallery API automatically.

Can I run it on a schedule or via API? Yes — schedule recurring runs in Apify, call it via the API/SDK, or connect it to Make, Zapier or n8n.

Is scraping the VS Code Marketplace legal? It reads publicly available Marketplace data only. Use it responsibly for research, and follow applicable laws and Microsoft's terms.

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